


Our Lost Days

by kenzieann27



Category: IT (Movies - Muschietti), IT - Stephen King
Genre: 1920s, Aged-Up Losers Club (IT), Alternate Universe - No Pennywise (IT), Alternate Universe - Time Travel, Ben Hanscom is a Good Friend, Gay Disaster Eddie Kaspbrak, Gay Richie Tozier, Gay Stanley Uris, M/M, Minor Patricia Blum Uris/Stanley Uris, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Past Steve Covall/Richie Tozier
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-23
Updated: 2020-11-24
Packaged: 2021-03-07 17:01:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 21,247
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26611072
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kenzieann27/pseuds/kenzieann27
Summary: Waking up in 2019 was not a unique event, of course, though to a young man named Stanley Uris, it changed everything. From learning about cell phones to whatever nonsense the 1950s were, Stanley learns that being lost doesn't always mean being alone, even if he's missed the last hundred years. Give or take a few.
Relationships: Bill Denbrough & Ben Hanscom, Bill Denbrough/Eddie Kaspbrak, Mike Hanlon/Ben Hanscom/Beverly Marsh, Richie Tozier/Stanley Uris, Steve Covall & Richie Tozier
Comments: 7
Kudos: 13





	1. The Ghost of 537

**Author's Note:**

> Writing this fic has been a very large ordeal, but it has been a very unique experience. Either way, I hope you enjoy it! Comments are greatly appreciated, especially in chaptered fics so I know where to go with the next chapters (and to see all your amazing reactions!).
> 
> I would like to dedicate this fic to my friends and all of the kind words you've given me lately. You know who you are :)

It had been a week since it had happened- whatever _it_ was. Even to Richie, who had the week to try and wrap his frustratingly energetic mind around this new situation in his life, this wasn't exactly something that happened every day.

Well, it was less of a _situation_ and more of a _person_.

A person, strange enough, that was born in the most ordinary year of 1908. Of course, this wouldn't exactly be a strange thing if it wasn't 2019 and that person was about as youthful as Richie himself. Stanley- as Richie had quickly learned was his name- was over a hundred years old, but he didn't look a day over twenty.

Even to the most energetic minds, this was a very unusual situation.

Richie was exceptionally tired on that day, that cold October day when he first came across Stan. Though he tried to tell himself he loved his job, Richie was beyond ready for the two-week vacation he was taking to, well, relax. The weather had kept him from wanting to travel anywhere (coupled with his fear of airplanes), but he didn't mind that too much. Any time away from the sterile, unfriendly hospital environment was time well spent. Even if it was to be two weeks of being holed up in his apartment and ignoring most calls and emails as he worked on his newest passion (as of late): comedy.

Of course, that _was_ the plan until a certain curly-haired kid from the lost generation decided to make his way back from what should have been the dead.

Most of the staff heard the stories, how a certain room on the fifth floor was haunted. Most of those who heard the stories, strange enough, believed them. Or, well, believed them enough to steer clear of that room at all costs, in case whatever ghost lurking inside might come out and cause all forms of trouble for them. Some say the room hasn't been opened in over fifty years, others say over a hundred; most staff reason the room is simply for storage, though none were certain what exactly was being stored in there. Richie himself couldn't care much either way, though he did admit sometimes that he had access to the room, for comedic purposes, of course. He was certain there was a joke there somewhere- a nurse walks into a haunted hospital room, blah, blah, blah.

But it was also on this particular day that one of Richie's coworkers requested he search Room 537 for his missing jacket, with Richie being much too tired to really put together that strand of numbers in his head, so he agreed anyway. Of course, under the condition that Stephen would be the one to deliver one finger splint to a patient back down on the first floor while Richie was doing so; it wouldn't have been much of an issue if the patient hadn't been named Edward Kaspbrak, who had been to the hospital four times already this year. "Oh, come on, Stevie, you know how he is with me. He never thinks I do anything right because of the time I accidentally dropped a bandage on the ground," Richie had pouted, willing to do anything to be able to get home faster.

"If you go get my jacket, then sure," he shrugged in response, trying not to laugh at Richie's groaning. "Hey, I want to go home, too. Just- just go get my jacket and bring it back to me, then we can both get out of here. We can go get dinner or something?"

"I thought you said you wanted to go home. Besides, it's pretty late." Richie pulled out his phone, checking the time ( _Ugh, midnight already?_ ) before he eyed the door out of the small break room. "Maybe another time- right now, I'm just thinking of going home, taking a nice long shower, and hibernating for the next week."

"Like the bear you are," Steve had nodded, smirking as he stood up from the table and tossed his water bottle in the recycling bin.

"I am a twink at best, you should know that by now," he rolled his eyes, feigning offense at the remark. "Give me another twenty years, though, and I'll fulfill all of the disgusting bear dreams you could ever have."

"Oh, totally, that's _exactly_ the stuff I dream about."

* * *

The ride up in the elevator was, as Richie had learned quickly when he first started working here last winter, a strange time; between working with the most unusual and unexpected people and believing nursing wasn't maybe the right career choice for him, Richie loved the few minutes he got to think and relax before being thrown back into the crazy world he wasn't sure belonged to him anymore.

This elevator ride, of course, was no different.

Though he would have gladly picked going up to get his ex-boyfriend's jacket any other day of the week, and under any other circumstances, Richie had become unsure of his choices when Steve had handed him his keys, alerting him that the jacket might not have simply been left in just _any_ room up on the fifth floor.

When he made his way down the shorter hallway to the enigmatic door, a flood of questions entered Richie's mind as he fiddled with the keychain in his hands. The key to this particular room, for one, was noticeably different than the other keys Richie had been familiar with in the hospital; this, of course, led to him wondering just how squirrely little Stephen managed to obtain what Richie could guess was one of the only keys to Room 537.

Richie shook those pesky thoughts from his mind as the keys jangled in front of him when he unlocked the door, having just enough time to take in the fact the lights were on before yelping in surprise when something rather scratchy was thrown in his direction, hitting his chest before falling to the floor in a pile of dark blue fabric. Bending over to pick up what he quickly realized to be a cardigan, Richie looked up to see an oddly apologetic-looking young man staring at him with wide eyes from his place in the corner of the room. A room, that, looking around him, Richie quickly realized hadn't been updated in a good few decades- at least.

"Uh.. is this yours?" Richie held up the cardigan, not completely surprised when the young man didn't respond to his question. He eyed the white jacket that was haphazardly folded on a counter next to the sink, walking over to it and grabbing it slowly as he set the cardigan down in its place. "I just- I didn't know anyone was in this room, sorry. Another nurse left his jacket in here, like the dipshit he is, so I'm just here to grab that."

"No, no," the young man stammered, shaking his head as he picked up the rumpled patient gown at his feet. "I should be the one to apologize, I shouldn't have just thrown that at you. You just startled me, that's all. I didn't expect someone to wander in here while I was putting my clothes on."

"Why-" Richie had begun to ask, looking the young man up and down, raising an eyebrow as he walked over to the trash can to toss out the gown. "Can you just sit down for a second? This- this has been really weird so far, whatever this is, but I'm guessing you're a patient, so I need to just... figure you out, I think."

"Well, aren't you just a flat tire," the young man commented, though he took a seat back on the edge of the bed, nonetheless. "I don't believe there is much to figure out, though. I'm feeling perfectly fine, so I don't see much reason for me to stay here when I should be getting back home to my wife."

"Everyone here wants to go home," Richie tried to shrug casually, though his mind was still struggling to wrap around this situation in front of him. Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed a small stack of papers on the other side of the sink, that neat handwriting distinguishable to him easily, even paired with the distance and his poor eyesight. "Was anyone else in here earlier? If you remember, I mean."

"I'm not sure. I- you're the first person I have seen today, so I don't believe anyone else has been in here," he shook his head, his eyebrows furrowing as he thought. "I only just woke up a little while ago, so I suppose someone else could have been in here while I was asleep."

Richie hummed in response, picking up and looking over the first page before glancing back at the young man as he tapped at his watch. Scanning through the rest of the papers, Richie began struggling to read the contents on the last page, though this was more due to the faded writing rather than anything to do with Richie's eyesight. He didn't know how to take in what he was reading, hoping by some chance it was the lost pages of someone's science fiction novel rather than this young man's history. Shaking his head, Richie brought his attention to the man with the curly hair, who was looking up at Richie expectantly. "I think it says here you were hit by a car? Are you sure you're feeling alright?"

"I honestly feel perfectly normal. I don't have much reason to lie to you about that, now do I?"

"I'm just trying to do my job, you know," Richie turned back to a previous page, setting the papers back down on the counter. "Stanley, I… you're quite the remarkable person, do you know that?"

"There's nothing remarkable about me," he stated quickly, standing up and staring at his cardigan on the counter. "I'm- I'm just… you're letting my sweater get all wrinkled, do _you_ know _that_? There isn't much you can do for me, so the least you could do is not ruin the only clothes I have here."

"You don't sound fine if you're freaking out over a wrinkled sweater."

"I don't need to explain my feelings to you," Stan commented flatly, standing up from the bed and crossing his arms. "I don't know what nonsense was written about me in those papers, but I can assure you that right now I am feeling as normal as I felt yesterday, so would you _please_ just let me go home?"

Richie opened his mouth to speak, though closed it quickly when he realized he wasn't sure what to say. He didn't know what Stanley knew about his situation, but judging by his reaction to his cardigan, Richie guessed it wouldn't have been a reaction he wanted to stick around to see. On one hand, he reasoned, Stanley deserved to know the truth; on the other hand, maybe right here and right now didn't present the best situation for Richie to go into an in-depth lecture on everything Stanley had missed in the last ninety-two years. _Oh, and by the way,_ Richie's mind thought sarcastically, _everyone you loved and everything you knew are long gone. Good luck!_

So, of course, entered Plan B.

Richie had sensed Stanley's tension beginning to rise simply from being in this hospital room (then again, he _had_ been living in nothing short of a closet with a bed for the last hundred years), causing him to believe that possibly the best place to let Stanley know of this new world he had been lost to was someplace not so cold and scary but warm and comforting. And nothing struck Richie quite as warm and comforting quite like his own home.

 _Richie's_ home, obviously- Stan's home hasn't been a home since 1987 when it was unforgivingly turned into a shopping mall that, ironically, has already been phased out by the convenience of online shopping. Time surely is a cruel mistress.

Grabbing the papers and folding them quickly, Richie nodded in Stan's direction, taking a breath as his plan started to take shape in his mind. "Okay, so… I will be right back, okay?"

"Where are you going?"

"I promise I will explain all of it later, but I need you to trust me," Richie pleaded with Stanley, a stranger, as he fished the keys out of his pocket.

"And why would I do that?" Stanley asked, confusion spreading on his face just as quickly as Richie attempted to stammer out a reply.

"Stanley, you- your story is amazing, okay? I don't know why _you_ don't want to be, but just understand that your life is way too much to try to understand, like, even I'm just starting to realize it and what it means. I just need to go get something to be able to- to help you-"

"No," Stanley shook his head, his breath shaking as Richie stopped his rambling. "I don't need help."

"I don't mean it like that. You were just freaking out- still freaking out- over your sweater being wrinkled. I need you to be calm, so I can get you out of here, and then I can explain everything in a place where there aren't a hundred people around at all times."

Scoffing, Stanley stood his ground, despite knowing full well that he was further infuriating the strange man in front of him. "How am I supposed to trust you when I don't even know your name? I cannot just trust a complete stranger, you know."

"My name is Richie," he blurted out, taking a breath when he noticed the slightest bit of tension leaving Stanley at the mention of his name. "I- I grew up in a small town in Maine, and I moved here to New York for college. I stayed for work, obviously, but it's been about five years since I first came here, I think? I live a good handful of miles away, but that's okay,- since nursing isn't exactly my favorite thing lately- I like helping people, but medicine isn't really- yeah. And, uh… oh, I have a pet cat, he's been at the vet since-"

"Okay, okay," Stanley waved his hands, trying to stop Richie's incessant words before they became too much. "I can see that we are at a bit of a standstill. You need me to trust you, and I need to know that I can trust you without you murdering me in some dark alley," he reasoned slowly. "I want to get out of here so I can get home because I'm moving this weekend- university, you know. You said you are a nurse?"

"Oh, uh… yeah?" Richie answered hesitantly, unsure of where Stanley was going with his thoughts.

"I don't understand… you're a man. Men are doctors, not nurses."

"You're sounding like my dad now," Richie chuckled, more so at Stanley's inquisitive look than his own comment. "My dad's a dentist, so he's a doctor- technically, anyway. I never really saw him as a _doctor_ , you know? But it turns out that I wasn't up for all of that medical stuff. I like helping people, but not like this."

"That's something I do understand," Stanley nodded, giving Richie a knowing look. "Not wanting to be the person your parents want you to be. Obviously, my father wants me to do accounting or something to do with stocks. Music is what I am interested in- I play the piano, you see."

"It's beautiful," Richie commented, continuing when Stanley looked at him with a slightly confused expression. "Piano music, I mean. It's relaxing."

"Well, I'm no Chopin, but I try my best," Stanley smiled, looking down at his feet before sighing. "I… just promise you're not going to hurt me or anything, alright? I trust you to get me out of here and to tell me whatever it is you need to tell me, but then I want to go home and forget about this, okay?"

"Yeah, of course- I promise," Richie smiled nervously as he grabbed Stanley's cardigan, handing it to him before backing his way towards the door. "It's my job to help people, Stanley, so I promise that I will not hurt you."

Stanley nodded softly, moving to sit back down on the edge of the bed and opting to look down uncomfortably at the clear tubing attached to his hand. "What is this? It made putting on my clothes more difficult than it should have been, but I didn't want to cause trouble by interfering with it."

"That's an IV, it helps with fluids and stuff, keeps you from not dying, essentially. I'll fix that when I get back," Richie watched as Stanley continued to stare at the room around him, knowing that he would continue to ask more questions about _everything_ if he didn't do something to muddle those rapidly increasing thoughts. "Are- are you hungry? What about some applesauce?"

* * *

"I thought I asked you to bring me my fucking _jacket_ , not an entire person," Steve shook his head as he pulled on his jacket, waiting for Richie to hand him his keys as he fumbled with his own coat. "Especially not _him_."

Richie shook his head as he tossed the keys, watching as Stanley reached up to lazily rub at his eye. "Just go get your car, alright? We can talk about this later, I just- now is not a good time. I just want to get home so I can think of what to say to him.

"You're not _actually_ taking him to your apartment? Richie, are- are you insane?" he asked incredulously before nodding towards the worn cardboard box that sat in Stanley's lap as the curly-haired man sat tiredly in one of the rather uncomfortable wheelchairs both Richie and Steve had grown too familiar with during their time here. "Give me the box, then. I'll take it with me- in case he makes an even _bigger_ mess of things by knocking it over."

Richie grabbed the box, handing it to the shorter man as Steve stared him down. "I don't know what you want from me. I- I couldn't just leave him there, he was miserable. He doesn't even _have_ anywhere to go."

"He's been doing perfectly fine here, Rich. He's just… he's more important than you think he is. Whatever is going on in that drugged-up body of his is probably the most important thing that's happened in the history of medicine, and you're just- you're messing it all up. I just… I'm not talking about this here, but this is not done," Steve shook his head, muttering to himself as he turned and walked out the door to the parking lot. "God, the _one time_ I'm not there, he decides to come back to life."

To say that the ride back to Richie's apartment was a normal one would, by all means, be an extreme understatement. Between Stanley's incoherent mumbling and Steve's stern lecture on the importance of science and research, Richie was aching to get back home and trudge upstairs to his apartment and ignore the world for a bit. A world that was completely new to the man that was currently rambling in the backseat about his parents and his friend Tommy; in three hours, of course, that man would be asking every possible question about every little thing in Richie's apartment. Even Richie himself wasn't too sure who would be more afraid of that conversation.

Even as he guided him up those stairs, Richie realized how afraid he was of this person in front of him. No matter how innocent he looked, how lost he was, how full of wisdom and hope his big brown eyes seemed to be, Richie couldn't help but feel crushed at his presence, knowing full well he would have to be the one to break his heart in just a handful of hours with a few simple words. And even as Stanley giggled sweetly as he tried to touch _everything_ in Richie's apartment, remarking in a mouthful of slurred words how weird his house looked, Richie couldn't bring himself to smile at that childlike innocence he would have to coldly destroy in the morning. _In the morning_ , he told himself. _Not now._

"Okay, Stanley, I- are you listening to me?" Richie struggled to pull the young man away from his kitchen, turning him down the hallway and towards the guest bedroom. "My room is on the other side of the apartment, okay? If you need anything, I'm just- Stanley?"

"I don't want to be alone," he whined, stubbornly refusing to walk further down the hallway. "You- you said you wouldn't hurt me, and you're making me be alone."

Sighing, Richie nodded as they continued down the hall, pushing the door open gently and guiding Stanley into the small brick bedroom. Richie himself would have taken this room to himself when he moved into the apartment last year (mainly due to it being closer to the kitchen), but a large window and an attached bathroom swayed him to the northern bedroom, despite the slight draft that seemed to appear out of nowhere. "I'll stay here, then. I'll go get you some pajamas, alright? Give me five seconds."

"You can't get anywhere in five seconds," Stanley shook his head as he sat on the edge of the bed, bending over to untie his shoes. "Richie's just a dumb doll, isn't he?"

"I have no idea what that means, and I don't know who you could possibly be talking to, but I'm going to just add that to the list of things that I assume you're going to regret saying when you wake up tomorrow morning, bud," Richie called from the other side of the apartment.

"I haven't said anything," Stanley replied, staring ahead at the wall as Richie returned with a plain green t-shirt and white joggers. "You're making that up, just- just like your friend said. Richie's just a big liar."

"I wouldn't lie to you," he said softly, setting the pajamas down and returning to his own room to change out of the scrubs he had been dying to get out of all day. "You know, you said _plenty_ of things in the car. I know how insane your brain is right now, though, so I will just-"

"I am not insane, Richard." Stanley shook his head, neatly folding his clothes and setting them on the nightstand after he pulled on the mismatched pajamas he didn't want to admit were very comfortable and soft. "I am just a normal young man who was foolish to trust you."

Most of the rest of Stanley's words for the night had been mumbled to himself, as he nearly instantly fell asleep after he fell into a comfortable position under the blankets. Though, Richie did like to think back to the short conversation they shared before their tiredness overcame the both of them, before both of their minds would return to normal. Then again, it was hard to say when Richie himself wasn't sure of what to think- or, God, what to _feel_ \- when he returned to the room that night to see Stanley blankly staring out the small window as the rain began to speckle across it, though he supposed it could have been guilt.

"Why do you want me to stay?" Richie had asked, moving slowly to sit on the edge of the bed and turning to look at Stanley's back, who simply shrugged at the question.

"I was so lonely in hospitals… always alone," Stanley blinked sleepily, though he continued to stare at the rain. "Just for one night, don't let me be alone."

Richie watched as Stanley turned on his other side, gesturing (albeit quite wildly) for Richie to lie down next to him. "I'm sorry," he admitted softly. "You don't understand it now- or anything, for that matter- but I hope someday you will."

"You are being ridiculous again, Richard," Stanley smiled, reaching out to take Richie's glasses off his face and handing them to him. "You'd break your eyeglasses if you slept with them on, you know."

"Why, thank you for noticing that, Stanley."

He giggled at the sound of his name, trying to point out how stern Richie appeared without his glasses, but Stanley couldn't form those words in his mind as he desperately fought off sleep. "You'll be thanking me in the morning- when you don't have broken glasses."

Richie nodded at Stanley's words, feeling oddly vulnerable as their late-night talk went on. "You'll be hating me in the morning, you know that?" he whispered, hoping for a second that Stanley was too tired to hear those words.

"But I do not hate you right now," Stanley closed his eyes, shaking his head slightly as he continued. "Not today."

"Not today," Richie repeated in skeptical agreement, turning around to place his glasses on his nightstand before turning back to look at Stanley as he drifted off to sleep.

Although Richie was completely unsure of what to do next, not tonight, and _certainly_ not tomorrow, he couldn't help but stare at the person in front of him, who was just as lost in this world as he was. And if his heart fluttered the tiniest bit when he noticed Stanley's nose begin to twitch in his sleep, well, that was just another thing Richie would be too afraid to share.


	2. Charles the Great

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After telling Stan about what happened, Richie is desperate to fix the situation he doesn't want to admit he created.

It was with great discomfort that Richie found himself waking up in a familiar bed, though it wasn't necessarily a bed he preferred to be waking up in. The discomfort, though, didn't come from the bed itself, but rather from a combination of the loud ringing of his phone paired with the fact that he had a stranger with obnoxiously boney fingers clinging to his side like a koala joey attaches itself helplessly to its mother. And as much as Richie would have loved to have stayed into this position with Stanley, even if he was seriously questioning how Stanley was able to wrap both of his arms and one of his legs around his middle, all the memories of last night came flooding back into his mind, including the very important things he had to disclose to Stanley as soon as possible.

It was better to rip off the band-aid, Richie believed. To get it over with before Stanley began asking too many questions for his increasingly sober mind to comprehend.

"Stanley," Richie finally said, nudging the young man as his phone continued to ring from its place in the kitchen. He rolled his eyes when he heard Stanley groan in annoyance; Richie continued to squirm out of Stanley's firm grip before he gave up on his clinginess and turned over on his opposite side, instead taking hold of his pillow. "I didn't really take _you_ for the touchy type there, buddy."

Groggily, Richie made his way out of the bedroom and to his kitchen (which was only about ten steps away, at the most), where he unplugged his phone from its charger and winced at the bright screen. Noticing the three missed calls, Richie shook his head as he redialed the number, muttering to himself as he listened to the tiresome ringing. "Seriously, Ben? You had to call me at eight in the fucking morning?"

"Oh, finally- I've been calling you all morning," Ben answered, yawning as he continued. "Mike wanted me to remind you that he's got a package coming in the mail today, so he wants you to go downstairs and put it inside our apartment when you go to water our plants today. If it's not too much trouble, of course."

"Yeah, yeah, it's- sure," Richie stammered, eyes going wide when he noticed Stanley walk into the kitchen and take a seat at the small island. "Just give me a minute, okay?"

"Who are you talking to?" Ben asked curiously, his voice becoming faint as he began talking to someone else that Richie could not identify.

Richie shook his head as Stanley started looking around his apartment, pointing in confusion at the television in the corner. "I'm- Stanley, I'll explain it to you in a second, okay?"

"Who's Stanley?" a high-pitched voice called from the phone, causing Richie to groan in frustration. "Richie, I can't believe we're only gone a week and you get yourself a boyfriend."

"He's not- alright, I'll get your mail, okay? I'll talk to you guys later," Richie rolled his eyes, watching as Stanley reached across the island to grab an orange from the fruit bowl. "Hope your flight goes well- you better have gotten me a sick refrigerator magnet, by the way. Alright, goodbye."

"Hey!" Stanley called out in frustration as Richie took the orange from his hands. "Since you so rudely woke me up early, I think I at least deserve an orange."

"We need to talk," Richie commented shakily, firmly believing he would vomit if he were to delay this conversation any further.

"Is it about the thing you said you needed to tell me about?" Stanley asked, pointing once more to the television. "Because I hope it has something to do with whatever that thing is. Actually, your whole apartment is very strange- I don't understand any of the things here."

"Yeah, it just… why don't you take a seat on the couch," Richie sighed, biting his lip nervously as Stanley looked up at him with a puzzled expression. "I know it sounds weird, but you'll want to be sitting down for this."

"You're beginning to scare me," Stanley replied as he stood up, following Richie over to the navy sectional, where he sat down slowly. "Why aren't you sitting down?"

"I'm- I'm okay." Richie paced in front of the coffee table, taking in a breath as the thoughts raced through his mind. He stared down at the black and white rug under his feet, counting the fifteen thin black stripes over and over as the thoughts in his head failed to make any sense. "Where do I even begin?"

"Well… I suppose I would like to know where I am. I don't really remember much of what happened last night other than talking to you at the hospital. At this point, I think I would just like to get home to my wife, since I am certain she is wondering where I am. So, would you please just say what needs to be said, so I can be on my way?"

"Stanley, you- you were admitted to Moore Hospital in May of 1927 after being struck by a car. You sprained a few fingers and suffered a concussion, but…" Richie shook his head, staring ahead at Stanley as worry spread across his face. Focusing on those dark brown eyes, knowing that whatever emotion Stanley would be feeling when Richie told him what he was about to tell him would be expressed there first, Richie took a deep breath, saying it all in one fell swoop. "Stanley, it's not May of 1927 anymore. It's not even 1927 anymore."

"What is it, then?" he asked, confusion filling his mind to avoid the feeling of total shock (or, at least, to avoid it right now). "If it's not 1927 anymore, what- what year is it?"

"Stan, it's… it's 2019."

* * *

He could tell Richie was searching for something, some semblance of a recognizable emotion that apparently wasn't on Stanley's face. Of course, Stanley couldn't care less what he looked like when all he could hear was a faint ringing sound in his ears and the pounding of his heart. Nothing about Stanley knew how to take what Richie said, even if what he had said was true; not his heart, not his brain, and certainly not his lungs.

Stanley watched as Richie talked, though he couldn't make out anything that he was saying. It wasn't true, it couldn't be true. This was all some practical joke someone had set up- Patty, perhaps? Or maybe Tommy… Tommy would do something like this. But if it were true, if the words Richie was desperately saying (or, at least, Stanley hoped he was saying; he couldn't take it if someone had been yelling at him right now) turned out to be true, then perhaps this was all some dream. Yes, of course, Stanley was simply taking a nap at home… any second now, he would wake up to see his wife's face smiling back at him before pestering him to grab the boxes upstairs.

He was brought out of these thoughts as Richie crouched in front of him, wearing those garish pink socks, holding out a newspaper and pointing to the date. _October 17, 2019_ , it had read. Stanley must have shaken his head in denial, as Richie left his field of vision only to return with a calendar, nodding quickly as he pointed to the same date: _October 17, 2019_.

Richie placed the calendar down on the rug, staring at Stanley with a confused expression on his face; Stanley knew Richie was trying to say something to him, but he failed to understand what he was saying. All he could hear was the ringing, the beating- couldn't Richie hear it, too? It was deafening, the way it drew louder, faster, more terrifying as each second passed. Richie couldn't hear it, of course not- he, too, would be going mad if he could experience this terror. Stanley shook his head at the world, the calendar, the newspaper- all of it. He couldn't comprehend it, couldn't trust it, couldn't believe… couldn't… couldn't…

Richie, looking as if he were dealing with an injured rabbit, reached out slowly, touching Stanley's forearm, which brought him back to the present as those torturous memories flashed through his head. "No!" he had screeched out, drawing his arm back. "Don't touch me!"

"Stanley," Richie said softly, scanning Stanley's face for some hint that he was listening. "You weren't breathing. Are you alright?"

The man in question shook his head, taking in shallow breaths as he closed his eyes. "Don't- don't touch me."

"Can you talk to me?" Richie asked, standing back up and taking a step away from the couch. "Say something, Stan."

"I- I can't." He stared at the floor, barely noticing the tears beginning to cloud his vision until they started to fall down his cheeks. "I- I-"

"What about a shower? You can take some time to think, and I can get you some clean clothes. You can sit and look out the window all day, if you'd like. I know how much you said you liked the windows last night," Richie smiled nervously, hoping Stan would give him some indication as to what to do next. "It's just a suggestion, though. You can also just stay on the couch, if that's what you'd want to do. It's okay."

Stan shook his head, fidgeting with his hands as he tried to clear his head enough to form a comprehensible sentence. "I… I want to go back to bed."

"That's okay," Richie nodded, taking a moment to breathe before continuing. "I'm not sure if this helps, but I'm- I have a couple of things to do today, so you can have a few minutes to yourself, if you'd want that. I have to go to the vet in a couple of hours and, you know, shopping- October _is_ the most amusing time to buy Christmas decorations."

"Christmas is too bright. All the colors and the messy trees and- it's just too much."

"Not a Christmas fan, eh?"

"I've never celebrated it," Stan shrugged, eyes growing wide as he looked back up at Richie. "I- I mean… we never really decorated for it."

"I guess Christmas now is probably different than it used to be," Richie reasoned, smiling at the thought of the holiday season. "I think I love the whole feeling of the season more than the holiday itself. It's like Halloween, there's a big buildup to it. I haven't really been able to do the whole Christmas thing in a while since my- Steve, my friend, he celebrated Hanukkah, so we did all of that fun stuff, too. This is my first time in a while _just_ celebrating Christmas."

"I celebrate Hanukkah," Stan said, feeling comforted by Richie's comment about his friend. "I- I'm Jewish."

Richie nodded, believing that their weird holiday tangent was what Stan needed to calm down at least a bit. "So… would you like to come with me to the store, or will you be alright here by yourself?"

"I can be alone. Just- just show me around here, please," Stan commented softly, knowing that though the request was small, it felt monumental to him. He needed something to get him out of whatever place his mind was currently in, to distract him while this nightmare- _of course, that's what it was_ \- played out. In no time, he would wake up, and everything would be right again.

"The apartment? Yeah, no, that's easy," Richie smiled, gesturing to the large room. "I think what I love the most about my apartment is that it's essentially just one big room. The guest room- that's where we were earlier- is next to the bathroom, and the kitchen is on the other side of that. This is just what I call the living room, but it's mostly a living corner. It's a couch and a chair and a table and a tv. But, uh… on the other side of this wall," Richie pointed behind him, turning back to look at Stan, who simply nodded in understanding, "is my room. I also have a bathroom and a closet and stuff- and if you do ever want to take a nap, I would suggest doing so in _my_ bed, since it's much more comfortable than that pile of rocks you slept on last night. I've been meaning to replace that mattress, but I don't really have that many guests, so I never really had any reason to."

"Could I see your room?" Stan asked slowly, taking the sleeve of his shirt and using it to wipe his face before gesturing to the overwhelming room around him. "This… all of this is just too much. I don't know what to think."

"Oh, sure," Richie smiled, waiting for Stan to stand up (as he did so much slower and apprehensively than Richie would have guessed) before pushing open the door to his room.

It was a messy room, Stan had easily realized when he stepped into the similarly-bricked bedroom; even though this room was a bit larger than the other bedroom, it certainly felt smaller due to the clutter. Stan wasn't sure where exactly to look in the room, from the flickering night light that was plugged into the outlet by the bathroom to the very colorful knit throw blanket on the end of the bed, everything about Richie seemed to scream _loud_.

"I- I think I like the other room better," he shook his head, looking down at the night light. "I do like your blanket, however. It's very… unique."

"Oh, uh, thank you," Richie replied rather uncomfortably, watching Stan as he looked around the room in minor disgust. "My neighbor made that for me for my birthday this year- Beverly, her name is. She's very pushy when it comes to confidence, but it is a nice blanket. I'd just rather keep it in here rather than out _there_ , you know?"

"Know what?"

"Well, I mean, it _is_ a rainbow, Stan," he laughed nervously, though grew confused when Stan looked at him with an expression that told Richie he had no idea what he was talking about. "I guess all of that's before your time, sorry. Rainbows are, uh… it's a- a gay thing."

Stanley nodded in understanding (though not _total_ understanding of the word, of course), scratching the back of his index finger to keep himself from reaching out and touching the fabric he could only assume to be absurdly soft. "I suppose rainbows are quite gay."

"Uh, yeah, that's what I… let's just go back to the kitchen then. You're probably hungry, you haven't really eaten a full meal in, what, ninety-two years? I'd be craving some eggs, too, if I were you- I mean, I'm not even ninety-two and _I_ want some eggs right now," Richie smiled awkwardly, motioning for Stan to follow him back out to the main room. "I think I might even have some bacon, if you're into that sort of thing."

"I'm- I don't eat pork, but thank you for the offer," Stan replied softly, staring blankly in front of him as he made his way back to his previous seat at the kitchen island. "You don't have to make food for me, either, it's quite alright. I'm not very hungry right now."

"Suit yourself," Richie shrugged, reaching up into a cupboard and grabbing the loaf of bread. "Are you sure you don't at least want some toast? I can put some peanut butter on it for you- that's always a nice breakfast for me."

"I'm alright, thank you," Stan mumbled, raising his head to look ahead at the bread that sat in front of him in its quite ugly plastic bag. "What- what is that?"

Richie returned to the island with the small carton of eggs, chuckling at Stan's confused expression. "That's just bread, Stan. I'm sure they had bread in the 20s, too."

"Not- the bread I know is not like this, no," he shook his head. "It's definitely not all cut up like this is."

"I guess people today do tend to take sliced bread for granted," Richie continued to laugh as he turned on the stove and began cooking the eggs. "It's just bread, though. It comes already cut up so you don't have to at home."

"Very convenient," Stan observed, watching carefully as Richie turned around and took two slices of the bread out of the bag. As Richie grabbed the bag and put it back in the cupboard, Stan turned his attention simply to the countertop, staring at it while the ringing in his head came back loudly, not allowing him to comprehend his surroundings until Richie had leaned across the island and tapped on Stan's shoulder, causing the shorter man to look up expectantly.

"I asked you how you were feeling," Richie repeated ( _How many times had he asked?_ ), glancing down for a moment at his half-eaten plate. "I told you all the stuff I have to do in a bit, and I wasn't sure if you wanted to come with me or not. I don't want to, like, freak you out with, you know, everything."

Stan shook his head, taking a short breath as he looked down at his hands in his lap. "I think I'll just take a nap or something, if that's alright. To just…" Stan paused, unsure of what to say next; hopefully, something that wouldn't make him seem insane. _You're in a strange- very strange- man's kitchen and he's claiming it is 2019, I think there is sufficient reason to believe you have gone insane, Stanny_.

"Hey, it's okay. Say no more," Richie smiled, nodding slightly as he hopped up to sit on the counter. "There is a bathroom just down that hall- you remember that hall, it's by the guest room- so if you want to take a shower or whatever, that's there. I am not entirely sure about what clothes you like to wear, but I guess you can just borrow some of my clothes for now."

"Why are you being so kind to me?" Stan asked, shaking his head as Richie simply shrugged. "I'm a stranger to you, we barely know anything about each other. For all I know, you could be lying about everything and all of this is some awful joke."

"I know it might be hard to trust me when I- I'm just a stranger, but I'm glad that you have," Richie gave Stan a sympathetic smile as he hopped off the counter, placing his plate in the sink and walking back towards his bedroom. "And _I_ don't have much reason to lie to _you_ about that, now do I?"

"That's not at all how I sound," Stan grimaced at Richie's poor impression of him, though he _did_ understand the words Richie was trying to say. "You might be quite gay with that impression, Richard, but it was mediocre at best."

"Stan, believe me, I am _beyond_ gay right now."

* * *

"There's something wrong with his eyes," Stan shook his head as Richie was trying to hand the odd-looking ball of fur that he had lovingly referred to as Charles over to him. "I don't- I'm not very comfortable with this."

Once Richie left the apartment, Stan took the opportunity to make his way to the bathroom, taking what felt like forever to figure out the complicated contraption that Richie had said was the shower. Even after figuring that out, Stan was not prepared to have to understand whatever hideous garments Richie kept in his closet.

"Does this man not own _one_ sweater?" he grumbled to himself before grabbing the least gaudy black button-up shirt that had a strange white grid pattern on it (though the more he stared at the shirt, Stan realized it wasn't as strange as it could have been; he passed over enough pink and yellow and green floral shirts just to be able to find this one). Pairing it with a rather uncomfortable pair of dark jeans that he had to roll several times, as Richie's legs were considerably longer than his, Stan groaned when he caught sight of himself in the mirror before snatching the rainbow blanket off Richie's bed and curling up on the couch that wasn't nearly as comfortable as the bed in the guest room, but it was good enough.

That is, of course, until Richie returned, loudly entering the apartment and seemingly talking to no one as he sat down a handful of plastic bags on the island in the kitchen.

"Oh, you're still here, that's great, I- it's not much of a surprise, as I told you what it was earlier, but I have a surprise for you," Richie called out amusingly, laughing as Stan looked over at him from the couch with a rather disgruntled look on his face. "I didn't mean to wake you up, sorry. But, look! Charles is here!" He smiled as he lifted the plastic carrier for Stan to see, setting it down on the floor and speaking incoherently to himself (it _had_ to be himself, right?) before standing back up and showing off a tired-looking black cat to an equally tired-looking blonde man on the couch. "This is Charles, he's amazing, and he will want to cuddle with you constantly."

Stan shook his head, with his refusal being more due to his fear of the cat's eyes than the cat himself; they seemed to be two dark bluish galaxies than the green emeralds Stan was familiar with most cats' eyes appearing to be. The cat himself, as Stan soon realized, seemed to be unfazed by everything going on, from the strange person in his apartment to being held like an infant by Richie, who continued to smile excitedly at Stan.

"Oh, come on, he won't bite. Mostly because he doesn't have any clue where you are." Richie sat down on the couch next to Stan, setting Charles down gently next to Stan. "That's, uh, why his eyes look so different, he's blind. That's also why this apartment is so great for me, it's just one big room- he won't get lost and he's not going to fall down any stairs, I don't have to worry. I mean, that is until _someone_ decided to get into the garlic that I spilled on the floor a few days ago."

"I think I want to go out tomorrow," Stan said flatly, scratching the back of his finger. "I think I might have left my wedding ring at the hospital or something. I- I don't know where it is."

"Oh, uh… sure," Richie nodded, smiling as Charles turned his head up to look in his direction. "I think that might have been in the box that Stevie took, so we could go over to his place tomorrow to get it."

"What was written in those papers?" he asked softly, looking up at Richie who only sighed at the question. "At the hospital, you had some papers about me, I just… I wasn't sure what was written in them."

"They were just medical papers- the accident and stuff. For a while, people looked after you, but they didn't understand what was going on, so I think they stopped. There's a huge gap between them but Steve found you one day- a few months ago, I guess- and he tried taking care of you. He wanted to figure out what was going on in that head of yours, why you weren't dead."

"There's nothing wrong with me," Stan shook his head. "All- all of that is just lies. All of _this_ is just made up- I think I might still just be in a hospital somewhere; I had an accident, and this is just my mind acting up. This isn't real, it… it can't be real."

"Are you sure you're okay, Stan?"

"This is all in my head, this isn't happening." Tears began rolling down Stan's cheeks, though he definitely couldn't tell; as far as he _could_ tell, he was on another planet. "I'm- this is not real."

"Stan-"

"I'm- I'm at home with my wife, I'm not here. I don't even know you, I- you're not real, none of this is happening," he sobbed, shaking his head as he stared down at the floor.

"I know," Richie said softly, standing up and walking over to the kitchen. "I know you don't believe me, you _can't_ believe me, but I hope someday you might. I know all of this sounds crazy, Stan, but it's- it's the truth. It's just the world you live in now, it's a bit different, that's all."

"A fucking bit? I missed my entire life, Richie! Everyone I know is- you say they're gone. I'll never see them again. And to make up for that you just- you bring me a stupid cat."

"Charles is not stupid," he commented sternly, watching as Stan continued to shake his head. "And he's not for _you_ at all- he's _my_ cat, I've had him for three years. I got him in college and it's just been me and him since then. I don't know, Stan, I just- I know what happened to you sucks, I know you're reacting this way because you just can't understand it. I thought showing you Charles would help a tiny bit because he's a lot like you. He's- he's lost, he's scared. Tomorrow, he might mistake an electrical cord for a toy and get electrocuted, you know? He doesn't have a clue what's going on, but he's happy with what he has because it's enough for him."

"Your cat didn't get to _choose_ what he has, either," Stan reached up to wipe his face, taking a shaky breath as he looked down at Charles, who had curled up next to him. "He just woke up one day and he was with you."

"Would you rather have stayed in the hospital?"

"I didn't have much of a choice. I hate hospitals, but I- I don't even remember getting here. Why am I here?"

"I made a judgment call," Richie called from the kitchen, growing exasperated with the conversation. "You freaked out on me because your sweater got all wrinkled, like… you would have started being like this if I tried telling you then."

"What did you do to me?"

"I just- I gave you some medicine, that's all." Richie stared down at the counter, unsure of what was going to happen next. "I know now that it was stupid, that I should have just told you then and then figure something out, but I just… I was tired, I was frustrated, it was the only thing I could think-"

"You drugged me," Stan said softly, looking down at the ball of fur next to him that looked back at him. "You- you had no right to do that."

"I'm sorry, Stanley, I just… I didn't know how else to get you out of there."

"No," he replied in an unnervingly calm manner, tossing the throw blanket on the floor and walking towards the guest room, stopping to look at Richie. "Just- just no."

Richie cursed to himself as he heard the door shut, believing that whatever this was, it wasn't going well; not that he had expected this conversation to go well at all, but it was beyond what he thought it could be.

Stan had spent the rest of the day in the bedroom, doing what Richie assumed to be mostly sleeping, coming out once or twice to use the bathroom. When it came time for dinner, neither Richie nor Stan himself knew what to do about Stan's obvious hunger, though Richie made sure to tell him that there was some leftover pizza in the fridge.

Of course, though, there was no reply.

There was also no missing pizza, Richie noticed when he woke up the next morning. He did smile when he noticed a dirty knife in the sink, with the jar of peanut butter and the loaf of bread sitting neatly on the counter next to the toaster. But the peanut butter toast had been made mostly out of necessity, and with Stan resorting to making the food from scratch out of realization that the last time Richie offered him food, he ended up here. That dirty knife, Richie knew, was more than just a dumb dirty knife; it was Stan's paranoia, it was Richie's anxiety.

The Cold War, they both realized, had finally begun.

* * *

"Stan?" Richie knocked softly on the door, looking down at Charles as he tried to fix the collar of his jacket. "I, uh… I'm getting ready to go over to Steve's, in case you still wanted to go? It's okay if not, though, I can- I'll bring back your stuff for you."

To Richie's surprise, the door opened slowly, with Stan looking back at him with slight apprehension before nodding. "Okay."

After changing back into his quite formal clothes from the past, Stan joined Richie in the main part of his apartment for a quick session of awkward silence as Richie tried to tie his shoes with shaky hands. "Sorry, I- I might have added a bit too much sugar to my coffee this morning."

Though he tried his best to follow the rules of the road, Richie couldn't help but glance over at Stan as he stared out the window, taking in everything around him. Whether he was pleasantly surprised or horribly disappointed, Stan never said.

"Are you feeling okay?" Richie asked, not wanting the ride to be completely silent; as music seemed to be a big part of Stan's life, Richie wanted to wait a bit before introducing him to the music of today (though as he recalled his father's disdain for his fondness for "strange" music, he wasn't sure how someone over fifty years older than Wentworth Tozier would react to any other genre of music than, what, jazz?). "You're, uh… very quiet."

Stan shrugged, looking transfixed at the tall buildings in the distance. "The city looks different."

 _Okay. Four words are okay_.

"Yeah, I think most of the taller buildings were built after your time," Richie frowned, thinking to himself before continuing. "We're not going to the city today- maybe some other time."

"What's that building?" Stan pointed at the window, turning to look at Richie before returning his attention to the city in front of him, the city he once called home.

"Which- oh," Richie smiled as Stan pointed out the window, even though he wasn't necessarily looking _out_ the window as he was pointing. he mostly seemed to be staring down at the floor of the car, but it was somewhat entertaining that he still wanted to know despite the disinterested look on his face. "That's the Empire State Building. I think that was built in the 30s."

"I think I remember that," Stan said softly, looking back out the window as he returned his hand to his lap. "Not the building, obviously. If it was built in the 30s, that's- Governor Smith talked about it a lot on the radio. Everyone wanted to build the world's tallest building because the economy was remarkable. I never really paid any attention to that stuff, which really shows how privileged I am, but music was my thing. Unless they were building another theater, I didn't care too much about what they were doing."

"Yeah, well, I guess it didn't matter," Richie shrugged, though was intensely interested in what Stan was saying (even if he couldn't understand all of it). "It's not the tallest building anymore- I don't think it was even the tallest building for more than a year. It's still a great building, though."

"I suppose," Stan sighed, looking down at his broken watch.

Richie nodded, though he was unsure what exactly he was nodding at; sometimes, Richie believed, nodding was a good way to simply recognize that whatever was said _was said_ , to acknowledge the obvious without making it too obvious.

Even as he turned onto that all-too-familiar driveway he's been to more times than he'd like to remember (and probably a few times he _couldn't_ remember), Richie wasn't sure what to say as Stan's curiosity got the better of him and he looked at the house with new interest. "I don't really see Steve's car, so I'm not sure he's home. I have a key, though, so I'll just go in and grab your stuff. Don't want to linger too long and have him thinking we're stealing all his _totally_ important shit."

"Okay," Stan yawned, looking up at the small two-story home in front of him as Richie shut the door of the car and walked up to the house. As he waited, Stan tried to preoccupy himself with figuring out the rows of buttons in the car, managing to slightly understand the air conditioning before growing frustrated with the buttons near the clock that didn't do much of anything (he would later learn that the radio needs to be _on_ for those buttons to function).

Luckily for him and his growing frustration, Richie didn't take _too_ long in the house, soon exiting and locking the front door with the cardboard box Stan vaguely remembered from the hospital. He almost felt bad for not remembering the box, since it was most likely the last bit of hope Stan had for believing that his past was actually in _the past_ ; then again, he didn't remember the last ninety-two years, so maybe he could forgive himself for not remembering that poor box.

"It's a bit heavier than I remember, which I think is good?" Richie asked as he opened the door to the backseat and placed the box on the floor behind his seat. "Maybe there's a bit more of your stuff in there than you thought."

"Was my ring in there?"

"I'm not sure," Richie said as he got back in the car and buckled his seatbelt. "I didn't really look in the box, Stan. That's- it's not really my place."

"I suppose it is better late than never that you learned that lesson," Stan commented, glancing back at the box before looking at Richie.

Though he wanted to say more, to say anything, Richie couldn't do much other than nod at the statement that felt more like a question, the statement Stan wanted to be a peace treaty in their endless war.

* * *

"What happened in the 1930s?" Stan asked as Richie frowned at the traffic in front of them. When he didn't respond, Stan continued, hoping it would draw him away from growing upset at the line of cars that did not seem to be moving more than five miles an hour. "You mentioned that the, uh… Empire State Building was built in the 30s. Did anything else happen, if you know?"

"The economy sucked ass, I know that." Richie groaned as the cars in front of him returned to a halt, cursing whoever decided it would be a good idea to drive around the suburbs of New York with shitty brakes on their car (and subsequently rear-ending a semi-truck, causing this nightmare of a traffic jam that seemed to never end). "No one had money, the stock market crashed, there was no food. The Great Depression, you know- well, _you_ don't know, but… yeah."

"That sounds awful," Stan said, heartbreak finding its way to his voice as he tried to imagine what Richie was trying to say. _Things were going well from what I remember. Why'd they stop?_

"Well, it- it wasn't _all_ bad, I guess," Richie shrugged, eyeing a small side-street that was slowly growing closer to them. "I don't know too much about history, but I think everyone pretty much agrees that FDR was one hell of a president."

"FD… Roosevelt? _Franklin_ Roosevelt?" Stan asked, surprise bubbling up inside him and replacing whatever heartbreak he wanted to feel. "Last I heard of him he wanted to run for governor. My parents didn't think too much of him, they thought his ideas were crazy. However, I suspected they didn't like him too much because he was disabled."

"I guess you do have to be pretty crazy to want to be president of this country," Richie followed the car in front of them as he turned the corner, hoping this would lead back to his apartment much quicker than the way he was more used to. "Especially for, what, ten- twelve years? People loved him, so they just kept voting for him."

"He was a good president?"

"Oh, yeah, of course. I mean, all presidents have their flaws, but, from what I remember from history class, he was really good. He gave us hope in a hopeless time." Richie looked over at Stan, and he would be lying if he said he wasn't fighting a smile at the way Stan was taking in the things he was being told. "Why?"

"I met him once," Stan bit his lip as he thought, the memory coming back to him. "I was about ten at the time, I think. It was for piano- the state had this big competition each year and the winners in each category went to the capital and met a bunch of important people. He seemed like a good man, he was very kind to all the kids. I hope I still have that picture, or maybe someone has it. It was a really good day."

"That… sounds like a very interesting story," Richie said slowly, quickly glancing over at Stan.

"It's- it's just a stupid story, sorry," Stan shook his head, looking back at the road in front of him as the ride back to Richie's apartment finally got somewhat familiar. "While I am here, I don't really want to bother you too much with that nonsense."

"I don't really know what to say to you anymore to help you believe that this is real, Stan. And your life isn't nonsense- I'm sure that there are whole teams of doctors and scientists that would love to disagree with you on that one."

Stan shrugged, taking a deep breath as he stared out at the world that was equal parts familiar and overwhelmingly new. "I guess it's just hard to connect what I know to all of _this_. Everything is just so loud now, I don't understand it. I think I am having a difficult time really connecting the dots from, you know, 1927 to now. It's a lot, Richie- I'd hope you would at least be patient with me," he scoffed as the thoughts poured into his mind, believing now that the problem was less with Stan's slowly-processing mind but rather with Richie's impatience. "No, it doesn't feel real, and I don't know when it will. It's hard to really understand this whole thing when it doesn't even _feel_ right. I just feel like- like I am floating or something, there's nothing really holding me here to make me believe that this is real. You could tell me everything that happened, you could show me all of the pictures, but it just does not feel real to me right now. I apologize if that's inconvenient for you, but I will get there in my own time."

"I don't mean that like I'm rushing you," Richie said softly, turning his head to look at Stan as the car slowed to a stop at the red light in front of them. "I just don't know _how_ to help you. I try telling you stuff, but it just seems to make no difference. I can tell you are upset, and that's okay, but I don't know what I can do."

"I don't want that. I've never been great at words, so I don't believe that your words of wisdom and- and logic are making me feel more welcome here. It makes sense, telling me all the stuff I missed, and maybe that will help me later, but it isn't what I need right now."

"Yeah, well, I am here for whatever you need now," Richie replied, giving Stan a sympathetic smile before turning back to look at the road in front of him. "Even if _I'm_ not exactly what you need."

* * *

For once, for once, Stan wished he could sleep a full night.

It had been a week since he had arrived in the twenty-first century, eight days to be exact, yet each night was plagued by bad dreams and even worse thoughts. Richie tried explaining to him more things that happened, usually consulting this strange device he referred to as "Google." He was mostly correct about the 1930s, though he oddly skimmed the 1940s, telling Stan that it was a can of worms to be opened on a better day. Stan even managed to meet Richie's neighbors downstairs, who seemed friendly enough; they (Ben, Beverly, and Mike, Stan had quickly learned their names to be) didn't know about Stan's situation, and he was somewhat grateful for that. They didn't know too much about him, and he didn't know that much about them, either. 

On these restless nights, nights plagued by bone chilling nightmares, Stan would simply wake up and cry. While his brain was still adjusting to being awake, he'd sit on the edge of the bed and look outside; the sounds and the lights grew oddly comforting, though Stan quickly learned that the best remedy for his late-night anxiety attacks was nothing more than a warm shower. The steam and the constant noise kept his mind foggy enough so that the anxiety could be muddled, but it was the feeling of cleanliness that brought him back to this hellish reality of his.

Of course, that was what _usually_ happened.

Of course, that _wasn't_ what happened that night.

When Stan opened the bathroom door to make his way back to the guest ( _My?_ ) bedroom, he was greeted by the sight of Charles, who simply sat on the floor with a small toy in his mouth.

"What are you doing?" Stan whispered, slightly startling the small cat, who turned and looked in his direction.

Rolling his eyes, Stan stepped around the midnight ball of fur but was surprised to see the cat following him into the small bedroom. Charles (with minor difficulty) hopped up on the bed, setting the stuffed carrot down on the comforter before laying down next to the pillow.

"You're a strange cat, I hope you are aware of that," Stan said, setting his dirty clothes down in the hamper next to the nightstand. Though Richie had been kind enough to loan him his clothes, Stan was growing tired of the gaudy floral shirts and ill-fitting pants (Richie's legs were, admittedly, noticeably longer than Stan's), so much so that he had followed Richie's advice on the fourth day to forgo wearing shirts to bed until he was feeling well enough to go shopping for himself. Used to soft matching pajama sets and thick comforters that seemed to suffocate you in your sleep, Stan was relatively okay with that change. Despite Richie's poor sense of fashion, Stan hated to admit that those white joggers of his were an item of clothing he had accepted as his own.

Smiling softly, Stan reached his hand out towards the cat, understanding from Richie that it was best to let Charles know you were there before bothering him too much. "You're going to do it, aren't you?" Stan asked as he sat down on the bed, watching as Charles stood up and made his way over to where Stan had sat down. "Bring me home, Charles."

Reaching out once more, Stan scratched the top of Charles' head, something he obviously very much enjoyed. _Soft_ , Stan had immediately thought as the smile faded off his face. _The ball of fur is soft_.

As he sat petting the cat that seemed to love it more than anything else in the world, Stan wasn't sure what to think. All he could focus on at that moment was the way that soft fur felt, that it was _real_. Stan shook his head as he brought his hand back to his side, sighing as he looked to the unopened box on the dresser; it was a box of nightmares, he believed.

"Alright, Charles, c'mon," Stan said as he stood up, calling for the cat as he walked back to the door. "You don't sleep here."

When he wasn't budging, Stan rolled his eyes and reached over to pick up the cat, who immediately began squirming in his arms, though he calmed down when Stan had pet him slowly.

"You sleep in Richie's room, Charles." Stan shook his head as he made his way over to the other side of the apartment, knocking lightly on the door to Richie's bedroom before entering.

Richie had been sitting up in his bed, laptop in his lap and headphones in his ears (though, of course, Stan didn't know too much about what either of those things was). He looked up when Stan entered, smiling when he noticed the level of difficulty that Charles was giving him, though the smile faded when he realized that Stan's hair was less of a mess than it usually was. "What'd you do now?"

"He apparently couldn't sleep either," Stan commented as he attempted to calm Charles. "I think I should be asking you what you did to him, since he never wanted to go in, uh, the other bedroom before."

"I meant your hair, Stan," Richie chuckled, taking off the headphones and shutting the laptop. "You look like you got attacked by a weed whacker."

"It was too long, I guess," he shook his head, slowly realizing that neither of them was wearing a shirt. "I, uh… wanted to get back to my old self."

Richie nodded, though he started growing concerned over the lack of response from Stan (as well as the fact that he was still holding Charles, who was not in a mood to be held). "Are you alright, Stanley? You look like you're gonna puke or something."

And he had, at that moment. Stan had grown suspiciously pale and was staring off into space as he looked down at the foot of Richie's bed. This, all of this, _was_ real, wasn't it? There was no lie there- no lies at all. _It's 2019_ , Stan finally realized. _This is actually happening_.

"Stan?" Richie asked, waving his hand in an attempt to capture his attention. "Can- can you at least put Charles down? I don't want you to drop him, Stan, he doesn't know where he is."

Hands shaking, Stan couldn't hear the words Richie was saying, only being pulled back into the moment when Charles- at that point, the only tether to this world that he had- was taken from him. _No!_ he wanted to scream, to tell Richie that whatever that cat was, it was more than just a clumsy ball of fur that was just as aware of life as Stan was. But all he could do was flinch away when Richie's warm hands landed on his shoulders, attempting to shake him back to wherever _here_ was.

"Please," he had cried ( _when_ he had started crying, he was unsure), wanting to back away from the confused young man in front of him, but his stubborn mind knew better.

The stalemate, at last, had arrived.

"Stan, you're starting to scare me, bud," Richie said, looking him up and down for any sign of something, _anything_ , to give him an idea as to what to do. "Can you talk to me?"

"I- I can't." Stan shook his head, feeling as though talking much more _would_ cause him to actually become sick, which was the last thing he wanted to do right now.

"That's okay," Richie said quickly, nodding his head to try and fully get the point across to Stan that, whatever this was, it _was_ okay. "I don't- I'm not really sure what to-"

Richie's rambling was cut off just as quickly as it began when, all of a sudden, those familiar thin arms wrapped around him in what felt like the tightest hug of his life; something he imagined otters would do to escape the terrifying thought of becoming separated. Though it wasn't an _uncomfortable_ hug, Richie would also reason that it was more out of necessity than of want, judging solely by the feeling of Stan's hummingbird heartbeat against his chest.

Though hesitating for a moment, Richie had eventually found the courage to return the hug, admitting to himself that whatever this was, it wasn't out of love. It was something out of respect, out of care for another human that so very needed it.

Though hesitating for a moment, Richie had eventually found the courage to return the hug, admitting to himself that whatever this was, it wasn't out of love. It was something out of respect, out of care for another human that so very needed it. Even if the last time he was in this particular situation- shirtless, being held by and holding someone who desperately needed it- was most certainly had its romantic connotations ( _beyond_ romantic, if he was being honest to himself), being here, right now, almost felt more important to whatever midnight lovemaking session he and Steve had. No, of course, this wasn't the making of love, but rather the expressing of love; if he wasn't afraid to do anything but breathe, Richie could almost define this as infinitely more important than whatever nonsense that romantic love was.

"You're okay," Richie had whispered, completely lost on what to do or say to make Stan feel the slightest bit better. "You're here, it's okay."

"Be quiet," Stan had told him, though it came out sounding more like a desperate question, an urgent plea. And Richie was quiet, despite the thoughts in his head and the feelings in his heart; the things in him he had, for as long as he could remember, desperately wanted to get out as quickly as possible. But he was, regrettably, quiet on this night. He could die knowing he had experienced this moment, but he could also live with the fact that it had happened at all.


	3. Pandora's Box

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stanley continues to struggle with separating the past from his life now, while Richie begins to realize that their situation isn't exactly as clear as he thought it would be.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> shout out to my lovely friend Liah for beta reading this chapter! go talk to them on tumblr, they're very cool @souptimey

"What's the Holocaust?"

In retrospect, Richie should have _known_ the question would have emerged sometime soon; as he tried to casually skim over the events of the 1940s for Stan, he could tell there was a lingering interest in that decade after seeing an advertisement on tv for a documentary on the 1940s and, of course, of course, it had to mention the Holocaust (without mentioning exactly what it was, fortunately, because 99.9% of people probably were aware of what it was). It was obvious that Richie was hiding something, especially since he always changed the subject whenever Stan tried to bring it back up. _Something had to have happened_ , Stan thought. _The 1930s were terrible, and the 1950s were back to being okay._

Stan also thought, as he sat across from Richie in a small booth in the strange restaurant he had been dragged into, that maybe now wasn't the correct time to ask when Richie's answer to the question was to instinctively spit out the orange soda he had been drinking.

"Shit, Stan, I'm- I'm sorry," Richie struggled to say through his coughing fit. "I didn't-"

"It's okay, Richie," he said quietly, moving rigidly out of the booth. "I'm going to the restroom. I'll be right back, okay?"

Hearing a soft chuckle beside him, Richie eyed the pale young man next to him, kicking him lightly under the table. "Don't give me that fucking look, Covall."

"I just wish I had been recording that," Steve smiled, shaking his head as he poked at his half-eaten sandwich with the fork in his hand. "God, the look on your face was priceless."

"I can't tell him."

"Since _you've_ taken it upon yourself to be his personal caretaker, I shouldn't have a response to that," he said, taking a sip of his coffee. "But, you know, as a person with common sense- strike that, as a _Jewish_ person with common sense- my response is that it's something you should probably tell him. From one Jew to another, dude, it's- it feels weird that you won't tell him."

"Everything I _do_ tell him makes him freak out," Richie said, frowning as he grabbed a handful of napkins to wipe the table with. "It's like he thinks everything is all happening at once. He thought we're still in the Great Depression, I mean- God, it took _three days_ to just explain the concept of space exploration to him. And we're still in the 50s!"

"You just gotta be patient with him," Steve shrugged. "He's not going to understand a hundred years overnight, Richie."

"I'll just… I don't know," he sighed, setting the wet ball of napkins next to his plate. "I'll get back to it when he can handle it."

"Sounds like _you're_ the one that can't handle it," Steve muttered, smiling when he saw Stan approaching the table.

"What'd I miss?" he asked, scooting back to his spot across from Richie. "I hope the soda doesn't cause a stain, I really do like this shirt."

Stan had looked like a kid in a candy store when Richie took him shopping for new clothes, though he did tend to gravitate towards clothing he was used to; sweaters, button-ups, anything but t-shirts and jeans. This particular shirt, a navy blue button-up, had quickly become Stan's favorite, mostly because there was a picture of a bird on the tag (a tag that Stan had cut off as it was "too itchy"). 

It had been twenty-one days since Stan had first entered this world. Though most things made him agitated and overwhelmed, he was surprised to see a lot of things were roughly the same. Everything nowadays either had too many buttons, too few buttons, or, in the case of the telephone, no buttons at all. He still struggled to sleep, sometimes went days without eating. It wasn't his fault, of course, he simply forgot about those things when his mind reminded him of the fact that, well, he wasn't exactly in Kansas anymore.

 _The Wizard of Oz_ , 1939. The first of many movies Richie introduced him to during their weekend movie nights. As Richie returned back to work, Stan spent a lot of nights alone; Richie wasn't a fan of working during the day, so his first choice was always to take night shifts. Mostly because of the current situation with Stan, but also because he found his mind to be more productive during the night. On particularly rough nights, Stan found him knocking on the door of Richie's neighbors' apartment, as one of them was bound to be awake (usually Beverly, who always opened the door with a smile) to remind him that what was happening was actually happening. Not a nightmare, not a fever dream, not some accident-induced coma. He was here, it was 2019, and things were going to be okay.

But, now, Stan wasn't in 2019. He was in the 1950s, when the skirts were short (well, _shorter_ ), the nights were long, and strange diners like these reigned supreme.

"How are you liking the 50s so far, Stanley?" Steve asked, tearing his attention away from the mess of a man next to him.

"Oh, I- it's hard to put into words, exactly, but I am finding it to be quite interesting," he said, staring at the posters and signs and colorful lights that seemed to cover every wall of the diner. "It's strange to think that I would have been in my forties at this time. I would have been sitting in a restaurant like this with my wife, probably a few kids."

"But instead you're here talking to a couple of idiots that are, what, ninety years younger than you?" Steve smiled, watching as Stan slowly began to stare at his cup of coffee on the table. He hadn't ordered any food, of course, stating that he wasn't very hungry.

"People were so happy, I- I don't understand it," he said softly, looking up at Richie expectantly. "I'm so used to the glitter and the gold and everything, but then there was the Depression. And, after, people just got back to acting as if nothing had happened. That's the part I really don't understand."

"Well," Steve began, glancing over at Richie as he thought of a reasonable answer. "It did affect people a lot, I think. People started appreciating things more, like food and clothes and making sure everyone was happy and healthy. Things were so bad for so long and I'm sure it just had this huge impact on people. A lot of things in history were like that, I guess- people don't know how bad things were because we just want to forget it. Or, you know, sometimes we just don't know some things since they were never really here in America, but it was still important to the history of, like, the human race."

"Like the Germans," Stan said, nodding in understanding.

Richie looked up at Stan's response, eyes growing wide as he tried to figure out what he could possibly have been talking about. "What?"

"Well, Tommy- I had a friend, Tommy- he was a bit older than I was- nine years older, actually. He knew Patty more than me, I suppose," Stan said, shaking his head as he attempted to form an understandable sentence. "He was in the Great War, so he knew more about the world than I did. He said there were people in Germany that didn't really understand what was going on, that they blamed their loss on so many different things."

"Yes, that's exactly right," Steve said, kicking Richie under the table. "There were people that ignored what actually happened, like they were pretending it didn't happen just because it didn't go the way they wanted it to go. Even if it was terrible, I think it's important to know those things and to share those stories. Especially when those things are important to history."

"I understand it a bit, though," Stan said softly, confused at Steve's sudden anger at the conversation. "They were scared and hungry. The whole world saw them as terrible people when it wasn't their fault alone. Wars aren't started by one person or one country. We're all to blame for making the world such a hostile place where war is the only answer, where we- _we_ \- are okay with killing millions of innocent lives over nothing. What did we accomplish? Nothing. We were fighting over some stupid land that belongs to no one because we couldn't stand to hurt our pride because we always want _more_. We are all humans, aren't we? Why can't we just get along for the sake of each other and the world we all share? Why do we have to be greedy and ignorant and- and privileged? That's all we are. We need to learn to listen to each other, to learn from each other, to just appreciate each other as humans. Humans are amazing things, like- we make art, we make music, we do things just _because_ and we can't even get along to understand that. It's been a hundred years and this," he gestured to the small television above them, where the news had been playing, "this is the same."

"Are you alright, Stan?" Richie asked, noticing him become more and more upset as the words continued to come out.

"Forty million people died in that war. Twenty-one million people were hurt, including Tommy," Stan said, reaching out with both hands to hold the warm mug in front of him. "Tommy lost his eye in the war. He was eighteen, he- he wanted to be a pilot, he wanted to paint, he- he wanted to do so much. He told me that after he came home, he just got some black paint and covered the left lens of his glasses, and that was that. Tommy was always so happy, but- but he didn't deserve that. None of those people did. They all had families, hopes, dreams. Instead, they were all just stupid pawns in some horrible game. War is- it's more than that. It's more than strategy, it's more than some stupid game that needs to be won. As a leader, it's probably easy to just think of soldiers as just soldiers, people with numbers. But good leaders don't let war happen in the first place."

"No one is just a number. No one." Steve looked at Stan sternly, taking a breath as Stan continued to just stare at his coffee. "And that's why it's important to teach these things, so that they don't happen anymore."

"The Middle East," Stan said, looking into the dark liquid that seemed so much more interesting than the world around him (or, well, more inviting, at least). "The people on the television say there's war there, it's been like that for a long time. As many as two million people have died. I know that we can think that's good, that it's not as many as it could be or it's not as many as the Great War, but that's still two million people. I feel ill just thinking that we are still like this."

"Maybe you're feeling sick because you haven't eaten anything in two days," Richie muttered, sighing as he looked up. "Stan, I know the world isn't really what you thought it would be. People are people, y'know? Conflict is always going to exist, and maybe there will be a day where we can evolve past all of this petty bullshit, but we just aren't there yet. That's why I thought maybe it would be fun to ignore all of that stuff and focus on all of the good things that have happened, like, we have houses that are powered by the sun- that's cool! I could get married right now if I wanted to, I could go see a movie that was completely made on a computer, I could eat some chicken nuggets because those are a thing now."

"What's a chicken nugget?"

"That's not- the point is that the world is still a scary place, yeah, but there are a lot of cool things that have happened," Richie smiled softly, glancing over at Steve. "I know it's stupid to just act like those things haven't happened, but I want you to know that the world isn't entirely bad. I want you to know that what happened _happened_ , that it doesn't mean it's still happening. The 50s were fun, that's why I brought you here. The war's over, the immediate threat is gone. We can just breathe and take a moment to move past the stuff that happened in the 30s and 40s."

"It must be pretty bad if he won't tell me, though," Stan said, looking up at Steve. "Is it really that bad?"

"I…" he began, not wanting to lie to the fragile person in front of him, but also not wanting to betray the person he had once loved. "I think the world isn't as bad as it used to be."

Furrowing his eyebrows, Stan didn't notice the way Richie smiled at Steve, nor did he notice the way Steve shook his head in response, anger setting back in on his face.

"I suppose that's a start," Stan said, lifting the mug up to take a sip of the bitter coffee.

* * *

If Steve hadn't offered to drive, Richie could have only imagined the looks he would have been given on the ride home from that lunch. He'd dated Steve for just about five months, he'd _known_ when that man was angry.

And he was _angry_.

"Hey, Stanley," Steve said as the car slowed to a stop outside the familiar brick building. "I think I want to talk to Richie for a bit- work stuff. Could you give us a minute?"

"Oh, that's alright," Stan nodded, smiling as he stepped outside of the car. "I'll go up and feed Charles. I think I forgot to do that before we left."

Richie gave him a small smile as he watched Stan disappear into the building, not wanting to turn back to look at the very obviously irate young man next to him. _At least he isn't so pale when he's angry_ , Richie reasoned as he was shoved lightly.

"What was that for?" he asked, turning and looking at Steve, who shook his head.

"Are you fucking kidding me, Richie?"

 _Here we go_.

"He's- there's no excuse. There's no excuse for that." Though he tried to come off as serious as he could, Steve knew there was no escaping the level of sadness when it came to this conversation, to this topic. "I don't care what his stupid friend told him, I don't care what you want to do, but I- I'm not going to just sit there and let him try to fucking tell me that shit."

"I mean, he's not wrong, Stevie," Richie commented. "I'm not a history expert, okay, but I'm pretty sure not every person in Germany was, uh... like that."

"Yeah, because the ones that weren't like that got murdered. That's how fascism fucking works."

"I can't tell him," Richie shook his head, watching as Steve simply scoffed in response. "I know he knows something. He looked so scared when he told me he was Jewish, like- I think he only told me because I told him about you."

"Yeah, a few thousand years of bigotry will do that to a person, especially back then," he sighed. "It's history, Richie, _his_ history. And you would know that if you stopped staring at him all the time with that dumb look of yours and just thought for one minute. He could have lived through that for himself, he- I can't even imagine."

"He didn't live through it, he was stuck in a hospital bed like some medical experiment that people slowly forgot about over the years," Richie said, lifting his hand slowly to brush a tear off Steve's cheek. "He's okay. I know it's important that I tell him, but I'm not sure how to put it into words. Things aren't going well with Stan right now, he still has nights where he can't sleep and he just cries for me to hold him. It's just- it's the last thing I want to tell him at this point. He has to know the world isn't still like that."

"It's easy for you to say that stuff when you don't know, Richie."

"I know that. I know I don't know how any of that feels," Richie said, leaning back in his seat and taking a breath. "Stan said it was good enough for him, that the world is better. Why isn't it enough for you?"

Shrugging, Steve shook his head, truly unsure of how to respond to a question he himself hadn't thought of before. "Because… because I _know_. I know how it was. Progress is good, yeah, but we're still not there. We're still not at the finish line. We're still running and I'm so fucking tired, Richie. I'm so tired of running."

"If you were him, would you want to not know?" Richie asked softly as he reached for the door handle. "To just be, I don't know… blissfully unaware of all the bad shit that had happened?"

"No," he said solidly, staring ahead as Richie stepped out of the car. "But when your boyfriend eventually finds out on his own what the Holocaust was-"

"He's not my boyfriend," Richie protested, rolling his eyes. "I- dude, he's not even gay. He was married to a woman that he mentions, like, at least fifty times a day."

"Don't- I was going to just continue since you interrupted me, but I'm not that dumb, Richie, I can see the way you look at him. It's the way I wanted you to look at me, alright? I've known you since college, I know you," he said, shaking his head when he noticed Richie's confused expression. "Anyway. Just don't expect me to come and help you with the meltdown that he'll have when he finds out."

"Is that how you reacted when you first learned about it?"

"It's who I am, Richie," Steve sighed. "I've always known about it."

Richie wasn't sure to think as he climbed the short flight of stairs, wanting mostly to ignore everything that had happened that day. Work had been nothing but stress lately with the way Steve glared at him in the staff room and home life wasn't exactly much better between Stan's emotional fragility and his constant requests for knowledge. He cared for them, sure, but he wasn't sure how to fix things when he didn't know how to or if he even should.

 _It's not like he'll be here forever_ , Richie thought as stopped in front of the door. And it was true, of course. Eventually, Stan would want to continue whatever life he had left, to find a good job, buy a nice house, have a family. Everything seemed to present issues, as one look at Stan's license or birth certificate would cause an unbelievable amount of attention to fall upon him. Sometimes, Stan would wake Richie up, panicking about the future and asking whether or not he was cursed because of, well, everything.

Sometimes, Richie thought he was.

"Oh, hello," Stan called as Richie opened the door, sitting up from his position on the couch, holding a squirming Charles. "Does he always get upset when someone enters your apartment?"

"Well, I mean… yeah," Richie sighed, watching as the noise of him tossing his keys on the counter caused Charles to jump out of Stan's arms. "I think he understands the noise of the door, like he can tell something is happening. When that door opens, usually that means someone is probably going to be coming into the apartment, which scares him since he can't tell who it is."

Smiling, Stan nodded in understanding, watching as Charles darted to hide behind the plant near the window. "What were you and Stephen talking about?"

"Oh, just… dumb work stuff," Richie said, struggling to think of the latest work conversation he and Steve actually had. "He was just complaining about this patient that is scheduled to come in tomorrow afternoon- he always seems to have something wrong with him."

Stan hummed in response, reaching to tuck a loose curl behind his ear. "He just seemed a bit upset at lunch, and I wasn't sure if it was because of that. Even if Stephen did compliment my haircut when he saw me, I was afraid that I was the one making him upset because of what I had said."

"Oh, no, you're fine. He, uh… he's alright."

Nodding, Stan stood up and moved over to the kitchen, taking a seat at the island and neatly placing his hands on the counter. "Can we talk about what happened at lunch?"

"What about it?" Richie asked slowly, hopping up on the counter next to the sink.

"You mentioned something that made me a bit confused, and I was wondering if you could clear it up for me."

"Stan, when you say things in that dumb vague way of yours, it makes me think you're going to say something way more serious than you are probably going to say."

Nodding, Stan took a breath as he simplified his thoughts. "You said that you could get married if you wanted to, and I don't understand what you meant by that."

"Oh, I-"

"You mentioned it with new things, which made me confused. You talked about computer movies and chicken, I didn't- could you not get married before or something? I don't understand," he shook his head. "You seem like a nice man, Richie. I'm sure any woman would be glad to marry you."

Richie laughed as he realized Stan's confusion, though grew somewhat confused himself. "Stan, I thought I already told you that I'm gay."

"I don't understand what you being gay has anything to do with this. And you don't really seem to be very gay right now, so I'm not sure why you're stating that when you're not."

"Stan, I'm always gay. That's how it works," Richie commented. "It's not like it's a choice," he muttered."

"Is it not?" Stan asked slowly, noticing the frustration grow on Richie's face.

"No, it's not," he scoffed. "It's how people are born and you just can't fight it. I've tried fighting it for a long time and all it did was fuck everything up. I'm still- I'm not exactly open about it, but at least I can accept that part of who I am. I don't care how many women my parents try to set me up with, I just- that's not me. Not by choice, but it's just how I am, okay?"

"I don't think I understand what you mean," Stan replied softly as he stared at the counter, willing himself to stay as calm as he possibly could when he believed Richie was getting angry with him when he really, truly, didn't understand. "Being- being cheery is a choice, isn't it? Tommy always told me that you choose that in life, you choose how to feel no matter what. You can choose to be joyful despite everything. People aren't- you aren't born joyful, you have dismal days sometimes. But you can choose to be okay with that."

"I'm not talking about that stuff, Stan," Richie sighed. "I'm, you know… _gay_. Homosexual. Attracted to dudes. I don't know any other ways to say it, so I'm hoping you understand what I mean by now."

"I- I understand," he nodded, continuing to stare at the counter. "Is that what Stephen meant when he said the world isn't as bad as it used to be? You can get married now, so… so it must be better."

"Well, there are still problems, of course, but yeah. It's better. I don't think I've really met the person I want to marry just yet," Richie laughed quietly, not really seeing himself as someone to ever really get married. "But it's good. Probably better than what it was like back then, I'm guessing."

"I wouldn't know," Stan shrugged, taking a breath before continuing. "And you're okay?"

"Why wouldn't I be?"

"I don't know. I just- you can see how _I_ look. I'm small, feminine, I've only been interested in the arts. My parents couldn't bear me as their son, they… one wrong look at the wrong person, they just sent me off before I even knew what was happening. Hospitals, you know, they just..." he sighed. "I'm not like that, Richie, I- I'm not homosexual. It's alright if you are, but I am not. I can't be, really."

"It's okay, Stan," Richie said, watching as Stan moved his shaking hand off the counter. "To be honest, I thought you figured it out weeks ago. Just the way I am and the way I am with Steve- Steve's gay, too, and he's about as open as the ocean. He's better to talk to about this stuff than I am, really. But… God, Stan, how did you not- I have a _rainbow_ blanket on my bed. You love that blanket more than anything else here."

"What do rainbows have to do with being homosexual?" Stan asked incredulously, shaking his head as he thought of any possible reason as to why the two would be connected.

"I know we're not there yet, Staniel," Richie smiled, shaking his head as he hopped off the counter, "but I think you are going to _love_ the 70s."

* * *

Stan wasn't the biggest fan of Richie's neighbors, but he had grown quite fond of them as their visits grew to be more frequent. It was a few days before Thanksgiving when he found himself sitting on the couch, Beverly's arm resting on his shoulder as she laughed at some strange video that Mike had shown her. Richie had described these people as if they were his family, so they seemed to visit whenever they wanted to and for however long they wanted to. Stan was okay with that, of course, as being alone wasn't something he had grown to be too fond of, but there was a question in his mind that he never knew how to ask.

"Stanley, would you like something to eat?" Mike called from the kitchen, holding his phone close to his ear. "Ben said he was going to pick up some Thai food on his way home from work and he asked if you wanted anything."

"Oh, no, thank you," he replied softly, smiling as he watched Charles run out from under the couch, mostly likely to go nap in Richie's room- clearly his favorite room. "Richie and I had an early dinner today. We had chicken nuggets, which weren't as interesting as I thought they would be. They're just smaller pieces of chicken."

"The way you talk sometimes is strange," Beverly smiled, though quickly continued when she noticed Stan's expression grow dark. "Not in a bad way, though. You just sound like an alien sometimes."

"I understand."

"Are you and Richie doing anything special for Thanksgiving?" Mike asked, putting his phone in his pocket and taking a seat in the chair next to the television. "Ben has to travel to Seattle tomorrow night so it'll just be me and Beverly, but we'd be more than glad to double-up with you and Richie if you guys wanted to. I've been told that I'm a pretty great cook."

"Only by default, Mikey," Beverly giggled before turning her attention back to Stan. "Ben and I are the worst at cooking, so it makes Mike look good by comparison."

"That sounds quite nice, thank you, but I don't want to impose. Richie said that he's going to California for a few days in January to visit his parents, so I don't want to cause too much trouble now when I'm sure I will be then," he smiled. "But thank you for the offer, it sounds like you two will have a nice time."

"We'll be missing Ben, of course, but I'm sure we'll have some fun," Mike nodded, biting his lip nervously before continuing. "Hey, Stan, Richie mentioned that you have a box of things from, uh, your time, and I- I was wondering if it would be okay if I could look through that? I just really love history and I thought it would be interesting to be able to really see what things were like during that time."

"Oh, I… I'm not really sure," Stan said, shaking his head. "I never really went through it myself yet, so I don't know if there's really anything worth seeing in there. Probably just some old clothes."

"That's alright," Mike replied, smiling reassuringly before glancing at Beverly.

"Why haven't you looked in it yet, Stan?" she asked. "Maybe there's some cool stuff in there."

"I- I think I'm afraid to, honestly," he stammered, scratching at the back of his hand. "It's probably a lot of personal things, things from Patty or Tommy or maybe even my parents. Things did not go well between us before the accident, I- we had fought. I hate to think of what happened to them since it feels like my fault."

"Whatever happened to them is not your fault. You never could have known that this would have happened," Mike said softly. "I'm not sure anyone could have imagined this."

"I was so scared when I woke up," Stan whispered, the ticking of the clock on the wall feeling like a knife that dug deeper into his skin every single second that it continued. _Time, time, time. Too much time._ "I never told Richie this, so I would appreciate it if you didn't tell him, but it was so frightening to wake up in that hospital. I'm not a fan of them, quite honestly. I woke up and there I was, but everything was so different. There were all these wires and tubes and I must've stumbled around for an hour looking for that light switch. I thought it was a nightmare or something, things just looked so strange. Now, I just- I'm still waiting to wake up, but that box won't let me. Opening that box allows me to stay here since I know my wife, I know she wrote letters, took pictures, made sure I knew she was okay. I think that's what I am most scared of, I'm scared of that box. I'm scared of seeing that progression of time because it'll just… I'm here."

"Why are you so scared of being here?" Beverly asked, watching as Stan just shook his head. "I think the world is pretty great now. Well, maybe not for us, but it's still nice."

"I don't belong here, Beverly. I belong back in 1927 with my friends and my family. This isn't my life at all, this was not supposed to be my life." Stan continued to shake his head, unsure of what else to do when he felt Beverly take his hand in hers (though Stan suspected she only did this to stop the scratching, which had begun to hurt). "I'm not meant for this. I'm just- I'm only just a young man that was born in 1908, there's nothing special about me. Shouldn't this have happened to someone that was special? To be able to experience this world. I can't even understand that gay doesn't mean gay anymore."

"You're special to us, Stan," Mike said, offering him a reassuring smile. "You might not think so, but you've seen this world like no one else. You've lived in a time where Beverly couldn't vote, where I couldn't even go inside most places. We don't know why it was you, but we don't know why it _couldn't_ have been you, either. You're here with us now, and I'm glad it's you and not someone that isn't as kind and smart and open-minded as you."

"I just don't think I can ever believe that," he sighed. "I'll never belong here, even if I might want to. It's- it's like what I had told my wife a few days before the accident, I said that even if we wanted to move, we could never really belong there. We'd always be stuck here; in our hearts, at least."

"You were planning on moving?" Beverly asked.

"It's a complicated story, but yes. Our friend, Tommy, had this opportunity to teach- he was always a great artist, but this was a real chance to be able to do what he loved. He wanted us to follow him since Patty always wanted to continue her education, and she could teach anywhere she really wanted to. I don't know if she actually went with him, after- after what happened, but I think she would have."

"Where were you going, Stan? Maybe you could get a better idea of where she went and what happened to her if you sort of mapped out a timeline or something."

"Giverny, I think was the name. Tommy talked about it all the time, and it sounded really nice. Peaceful, at least." Stan shook his head as he spoke, trying to remember those moments that seemed as though they occurred yesterday and not ninety-two years ago. "Even though my family had a good bit of money, I had never been to France. I was nervous to go, but I was okay with it. Giverny seemed nice and France seemed peaceful, and that's all I wanted."

* * *

Though Stan, as Richie had learned, wasn't the best at doing some menial chores around the apartment (though Richie certainly gave him a pass when it came to the laundry), Richie also realized that Stan was a pretty great cook.

Richie was used to celebrating Christmas, as he had done so for twenty years of his life, but he had grown fond of Hanukkah as well; having celebrated it with Steve, he didn't miss the turkey or ham much at all once he realized how fantastic Jewish food can be. Finally, someone who appreciated the beauty of the potato just as much as he did.

"I kinda regret not teaching you how to use the stuff in my kitchen a bit sooner, Stan," he chuckled as he stared across the island at the curly-haired young man that was working hard at baking a small batch of star-shaped sugar cookies. "I didn't know you make cookies for Hanukkah."

"It was the one tradition I had with my parents, I think. Instead of just going down to a bakery to buy them, my mother and I would sit in the kitchen and make the cookies. I always had a hard time figuring out Jewish things when I was younger and being part of that life, so she'd cut them into shapes and use the frosting to do the symbols and whatnot. I know all of those things now, but I still would like the cookies."

"What, are the pancakes not good enough for you?"

"I think I prefer regular pancakes to the potato ones, thank you," Stan smiled, sliding on the oven mitt to place the cookies in the oven. "But they are delicious on special occasions."

"Okay, well… as interesting as this has been, I think I want to liven the mood a bit with some music," Richie commented, picking up his phone.

"Oh, would you happen to have any Schubert records? Or Bach- I suppose Bach would be better if you would like to 'liven the mood,' as you said."

"No, Grandpa, I don't have any records," Richie scoffed as he scrolled through his phone. "Going a little out of order here, but music is digital today- well, you can still buy records and CDs and stuff, but I think most people just use their phones to find music they like."

Stan nodded as he listened, watching as Richie's eyes seemed to move faster than the speed of light as he looked at that strange device he'd never understand. "So, what music do _you_ like?"

"Well, I- I'm trying to find different music, actually. You're a bit overdue for a history lesson, so I'd like to take this opportunity, and this wonderful snowy night, to introduce you to the absolute batshit crazy decade that was the 1960s. You would have hated it."

"Why do you say that?" Stan asked, chuckling at Richie's words. "I was known to be quite fun, thank you very much. I once tied my hat upside down on my head and carried thirteen apples from the shop to my parents' house in it. I got some strange looks, but it was fun- Tommy dared me to do it, and Patty just howled with laughter. She had a very nice laugh, that one."

"You don't strike me as someone that would wear hats, Staniel. Like, your hair is too important for that shit."

"Well, most men wore hats… I suppose it was just the style. I had a nice boater hat, it had a thin black ribbon that was tied in a neat bow at the back. My parents hated that hat, they preferred the newsboy hats, but it was my favorite," Stan recalled, turning around and picking up the small container of vanilla frosting. "As for my hair, I- I always kept it oiled back. My father said that curls were very feminine, so he straightened them out whenever he could. I'm not used to them being like this, actual curls, but it's nice. I feel more like myself."

Nodding, Richie smiled as he glanced up quickly from his phone, though just as quickly returned his attention to the device in his hands. "Ah, okay, so… I mean, the 60s were all- as someone not from the 60s, I think I had a vague understanding of the music since, uh, Woodstock and all that, but the music was really interesting then. Raw seems to be the word that comes to my mind, it's a lot of free and simple songs. I recognize the instruments that are being played, anyway- music today is so overproduced that it's just _sound_. You'll have the 80s to thank for that."

"I didn't take you to be the musical genius here, Richard."

"Well, I'm not, but- music is just a universal language, y'know? The universal language of wanting to be understood," Richie said quietly, setting his phone down on the counter. "I don't mean to get all stupid and deep, sorry- music is just something everyone loves, it makes people happy. That's why I want to do comedy, I want to be able to go and just open myself up and express myself in a way that makes other people happy because they _know_ , they understand that feeling. Humans are weird like that."

"What music do you have?"Stan asked, gesturing to Richie's phone. "You are making it sound quite interesting, so I would like to hear something. Put on something fun."

Smirking, Richie scrolled the app on his phone, pausing for a moment as he came across something not entirely strange but strange enough that it would pique Stan's interest in what was always Richie's favorite decade to learn about in school. "Okay, so I have a bit of a proposition for you, Stanny. I'll play you a song in exchange for you coming over here and dancing with me. Music isn't much fun when you aren't dancing, and dancing was _so_ important to the 60s. You're lucky I'm not pulling a Woodstock and getting high as shit and taking my clothes off or whatever."

"I think you keep mentioning this 'Woodstock' as if I know of what that is," Stan shook his head, turning around and looking at the timer on the oven. "Also, I would not recommend taking any foreign substances or removing your clothes, but I will humor you and listen to one song. Even if you are making this decade out to be more interesting than it probably was."

"All your questions shall be answered, my dear, if you join me for this dance," Richie said, tapping his phone and stretching his hand towards Stan as he hopped off his chair. "I know you'll love it."

"I hope you only know that I'm only agreeing to this to pass the time," Stan sighed, taking Richie's hand and allowing himself to be pulled to an empty space between the kitchen and the living room. "The cookies still have about four minutes, so I would suggest that we do this quickly."

"I'm sure your wife wasn't the biggest fan of you," Richie snickered. "Plus, I think, Bob Dylan deserves your respect, dude. Give him a few minutes of your undivided attention so you can just appreciate the song and how different it is. Sometimes you gotta appreciate the differences in things- like, I'll listen to music today and appreciate it, even if I don't always like it. I'm not going to just hate on something because I don't understand it."

"Well, aren't you an insightful one this evening," Stan smiled as he blindly followed Richie's lead, though that was mostly due to him wanting to focus on the song that he had made out to be the most important thing right now. "I don’t- this song is strange. I thought you said you were livening the mood, not confusing me with a song that appears to be a slow song as we are dancing as if it is one."

"I wanted to pick a song that I thought really, I don't know… showed what the 60s really were like. I could've picked, like, Jimi Hendrix or The Beatles or something, but I like this song. It just feels very real and simple. Plus, like, it makes me think of life, I guess- being close to people and nature and just caring about things that you people don't care about."

"I suppose it isn't the _worst_ song I've heard."

"People overlook the music of the 60s too much, I think. They just want to skip right to the 70s because of all the new stuff, but the old stuff is good," Richie smiled softly as Stan wrinkled his nose in minor disgust. "Well, old to me, anyway- I imagine the music of the 1910s was not all that great."

"It was a lot of war songs, from what I remember. Songs about helping soldiers and making sure they come home safe from the war," Stan said, sighing as he glanced at the timer on the oven. "I never supported the war. I thought it was strange that we got involved at all. I think that's the United States's main problem, actually… we tend to stick our noses where they don't belong when we really need to sort out our own problems."

"Maybe that's why we do it," Richie replied softly, watching as Stan's eyebrows furrowed in confusion. "We're scared to admit that we're broken, that the- the country is broken, so we come up with excuses and create problems in other countries to justify the fact that we aren't helping our own people when, in reality, our answer to helping out ourselves is killing others. We say we want peace when we're the ones making war."

"I don't think we'll ever overcome that. We're too chaotic, I think, to want to settle down and just care about someone else that isn't us."

"What if we want to, but we just don't know how?" Richie asked, searching those dark brown eyes for an answer to a question he didn't know he had asked. "How do we learn how to care about others when we spend so much time hurting them- hurting ourselves?"

Stan shook his head as Richie stared at him, not sure how to answer such a question when he couldn't come up with any answer in his empty mind (empty except for the sound of his own heartbeat pounding throughout his body) as they continued to turn around and around in their small circle in the small apartment that, in their moment, could not get any smaller. Stan would have let the moment continue further, would have figured out an answer to Richie's desperate question, would have let him come closer.

But he didn't, of course, because the clock on the stove had to- _had to_ \- finally reach zero with an incessant ringing that quickly brought them out of whatever spell they had been trapped in.

"I should probably check on the cookies," Stan said, taking a small step back as Richie just nodded at his statement (though Stan was unsure if he had actually heard what he had said). "I don't want to overcook them."

"Yeah, no, of course," Richie nodded, taking a breath as Stan returned to the kitchen. "Time's up, after all."

* * *

Stan's breath shook as he stared at the mirror; he had an unfortunate habit of doing this most nights, the nights he couldn't sleep. It was New Year's Eve, which Stan knew was always an important thing here in New York (or, at least, it was a tradition that even he remembered from his youth), and it was about three in the morning, when he knew he should be asleep, but he couldn't shake those thoughts in his head.

He'd been here, with Richie, for the past two months, but he couldn't help but feel like he was lost, that he was still clinging to a past he believed no longer existed. Patty was dead, Tommy was dead, his parents were dead- entire generations of people were born, lived, and died, and he would never know them. People he could have befriended, people he could have loathed, people he could have loved. Why were they gone but he was cursed to be here? Here, of all places? Here, here, here?

"'We don't know why it _couldn't_ have been you, either.'" Stan scoffed as he whispered Mike's words, reaching up to wipe the tears off his cheeks. "I don't even know who I am anymore."

And that was true, of course, wasn't it? It had been two months, and Stan still didn't know what the hell he was doing. He barely believed that this was real, that he wasn't dreaming. He so desperately wanted to wake up and be home with Patty, with Tommy. Even if he had slight doubts back then about who he was and who he wanted to be. Though, Stan believed that lying to himself about himself was a whole lot better than not knowing who he was at all.

Richie wasn't here on this night, though it wasn't due to work this time. No, Richie was simply downstairs, enjoying a party with a group of friends Stan wasn't entirely ready to meet (though, judging by the time and the lack of noise from below, Stan believed they were doing more sleeping than any sort of partying). Stan knew most of them, the neighbors, but there were a handful of names Richie mentioned earlier that day that he didn't know, Kay and Audra and Carol and Bill and Bradley, though Richie did admit that he didn't know them too well. He did go as far as to mention that he hadn't even met Bill before, that he was a close friend of Ben's that was visiting for the weekend, which did help to sway Stan into staying here instead of venturing downstairs into the great unknown. For tonight, at least.

Stan sighed as he made his way back to the guest room, taking a seat on the edge of the bed and watching as the snow continued to fall outside before turning his attention to that box of his that did nothing but collect dust on top of the dresser.

"What am I to do with you?" he asked, tapping his fingers against his thigh as the box seemed to stare right back at him. "You're all I have left of me. You know that, right?"

The only answer he received, quite ironically, was the distant sound of the clock ticking in the kitchen, the sound that kept him awake on quiet nights like these. The pounding sound that reminded him quite cruelly of lost time, of every second he had wasted by being here. It mocked him, it tormented him.

 _No more_ , Stan thought, nearly leaping off the bed to grab the box off the dresser and taking a seat on the floor. _No fucking more_.

Tossing the lid behind him, Stan sighed as he caught a glimpse of the contents of the box, of the remains of himself. Without moving any of the contents, it would appear as if all that was in the box was a large stack of envelopes and folded papers; picking them up and setting them aside in a neat pile, a large smile grew on Stan's face as his eyes caught something a bit more interesting that sat inside his box.

"Oh, Stripe, how I missed you," he said softly, gently picking up the worn boater hat and placing it on his head. "You still fit as perfectly as ever, old friend."

Knowing that it was Patty that had packed this box, Stan smiled as he picked up item after item, each small thing reminding him of the person that he had once been. Even if he wasn't that person, his heart melted at the warm reminder nonetheless. And his smile grew as he glanced over the written notes, the old photographs. Even that ugly old baby photograph of his, the one that made Patty giggle non-stop whenever she caught a glimpse of it, made him smile enough to clutch the frail picture to his chest, willing it to never leave again.

Though he sat aside the letters that were dated after that day, Stan couldn't help but know that Patty stayed with him. Maybe not physically- Giverny, after all- but she was _there_. She didn't give up on him the way he couldn't help but feel that he gave up on her. Even as he found that ring of his, even as he put it on as quickly as he possibly could have, he knew it would never be enough. That, deep down, he was conscious of the choices he had made; he got upset, he got angry, he ran out into the street while Patty was doing her best to calm him down. Stan didn’t listen to her, he knew he wasn’t, and everything fell apart because of that. Because of him, because he didn’t listen, because he didn’t turn around and see the fear that was on her face, too.

Reaching the bottom of the box, Stan picked up the thick folder, thumbing through a few pages of medical mumbo-jumbo before taking one last glance inside the box, causing him to promptly drop the folder in order to scramble to grab an infinitely more interesting object, the last object, of a life that Stan had quickly grown to be proud of.

His hands shook as he held that tiny piece of metal, the thing he knew he didn't deserve after everything he had done. But it was here, in his hands; hands that held it so gently it might as well have been made of glass.

"Tommy," Stan whispered, brushing his fingers over the indented letters he knew too well but could never get tired of, reading the name aloud as if it was a blessing. "Thomas J. Denbrough, whatever happened to you?"

**Author's Note:**

> Come yell at me on Tumblr, please! @kenzie-ann27


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